This comes nine months after two NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Sunita Williams were stranded there on a mission that was meant to last about a week.

NASA's two stranded astronauts were overjoyed to welcome the SpaceX crew, representing the U.S., Japan and Russia, to the ISS on Sunday.

SpaceX's spacecraft has arrived at the International Space Station (ISS) to bring two NASA astronauts back to Earth. They have been stranded in orbit since June 2024, reports The Guardian. According to the publication,

Reaching orbit from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center, the newest crew includes NASA’s Anne McClain and Nichole Ayers, both military pilots; and Japan’s Takuya Onishi and Russia’s Kirill Peskov, both former airline pilots. They will spend the next six months at the space station, considered the normal stint, after springing Wilmore and Williams free.

The two astronauts who crewed the Boeing Starliner have greeted their replacements, who arrived Saturday night at the International Space Station.

NASA astronauts Sunita Williams, Nick Hague, Barry Wilmore, and Donald Pettit unbox Thanksgiving meals, from the International Space Station (ISS), in this screen grab taken from a handout video, released on November 26,

The four newcomers — representing the U.S., Japan and Russia — will spend the next few days learning the station's ins and outs.